VB2018 paper: Who wasn’t responsible for Olympic Destroyer?

Posted by Martijn Grooten on Oct 30, 2018

It may be hard to believe, but it was only eight months ago that the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games were targeted by malware named Olympic Destroyer. Though not the first time the Olympic Games had been the target of malware, Olympic Destroyer, as its name suggests, did appear to be destructive in nature.

Cisco Talos researchers Paul Rascagnères and Warren Mercer were among the first to write about the malware. They also presented a detailed paper about it at VB2018 in Montreal.

In their paper, as well as in their presentation in Montreal, they analysed the malware and looked at one particular issue that made Olympic Destroyer noteworthy: attribution. The malware appeared to contain various false flags that could (and in some cases did) confuse attribution. The authors warn that attribution isn't as easy as it often seems.

Different media outlets published conflicting stories in relation to attribution.

We have now published Paul and Warren's paper in both HTML and PDF format. We have also uploaded the video of their presentation to our YouTube channel.

We see a lot of spam in the VBSpam test lab, and we also see how well such emails are being blocked by email security products. Worryingly, it is often the emails with a malicious attachment or a phishing link that are most likely to be missed.

Have you analysed a new online threat? Do you know a new way to defend against such threats? Are you tasked with securing systems and fending off attacks? The call for papers for VB2019 is now open and we want to hear from you!

Today, we publish a VB2018 paper by Google researcher Maddie Stone in which she looks at one of the most interesting anti-analysis native libraries in the Android ecosystem. We also release the recording of Maddie's presentation.

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